The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1887-03-16
THE WOMEN OF CAPE COD.
Beautiful When Young and Hag-
gard at Thirty Years.


IF there was ever a blighted race of
women. said gentleman of this city,
recently returned from a visit to Cape
Cod, sit exists in the peninsular will
ages of Massachusetts, which depend on
the hsherleS tor the support OF their in
haDitantS. Nowhere else in all New Eng
!and Will one see 50 high an average of
female beauty, especially in symmetry
OF form aud freshness of complexion:
but 1t viii not take one long to discover
that this girlish beauty and freshness,
while unusual and unexpected is also
| in its duration very brief. The change
produced in those girls by the lapse of
lew years is painful TO observe. No
| matronly graces are TO be, seen among
them after their glrlh0od days are
passed. That charming middle stage of
maturing womanhood, between the
the freshness and buoyancy of the girl
or twenty and the woman of thirty-tive
or forty, is entirely absent. The height
ened color of the cheek is gone. The ewes
are sunken, and they wear a constant
look of sadness and anxiety. Gray hair
in heads over which score and half
OF years have scarcely passed, aud deep
lines IN faces which show no trace OF age
Tor years TO come, are rather the rule
than the exception. Those women, be
sides suffering from all the inevitable
sorrows which fall to woman lot. no
| matter in what station she NAV be
placed, have an added intense and per
petual sorrow all their own. Theirs is
life OF continual suspense and anxiety,
which is almost certain in time to be
emblttered by an overwhelming grief.
The most obtuse observer needs not
q b tlsa Of ~ E.oE - II.
matrOnly beauty among these women,
whose budding days open wish the
| greatest promise OF a superb physical
womanhood. The cause suggests itself
at once to enc VINO sees the eongrega-
ton OF women on the benches ardin lie
! quiet streets u the sleepy villages. He
Will notice occasionally = feeble om
woman among them. generally sap
| ported on the arm of some female com
| panion, who, most likely, carries on her
other arm a chubby-faced enid of lustv
lungs. But in these groups, or any
where around the village. the observer
will look in vain for rhe presence Of
males between the tottering years OF
these relics of the past and the pratt
ing days of babyhood. is the fishing
season, and there are no men OF boys On
shore. Their smacks are tossing on the
and their return, if they return at all. is
as uncertain as the weather, which
forms the one great subject of conjse-
ture and apprehension among the viliag-
| ers. Husbands, sons, fathers, brothers
! and SWeethearts are somewhere cut on
the bosom OF the sea, probably home
ward bound, perhaps steering for still
more dlstaat waters, perhaps struggling
for life among the waves. Fair weather
keeps hope warm in many an anxious
| woman's heart; the bowling nertheaster
| fills it with doubt and despair Con-
stantly watching by day, waking in the
night to listen to sounds from the sea,
whether they may be the roaring of the
dreaded tempest or merely the moan of
the surf on the beach, Is it any wonder
that the torture OF mind and heart and
strain OF nerve and vital force that must
follow this perpetual suspense and long
ing destroy the fountains of youth aud
beauty IN these patient, suffering
women and place upon them the marks
OF age while they are yet young?
- 1et the girls grow up with but one
thought Of what their future lot will be:
with but one object in view upon which
their visions of happiness are based. Go
among any group of these bright girls,
In any of the villages of the class [ am
speaking Oh, and You Will ind that nine
out Of ten of them look forSaTd to q
union with some one who will spend his
life fishing in the summer and coastlng
in the winter. The idea that there
! might be any other future than the one
which Is to come to them astishermen'E
wives, or that the life of isherman's
wife is anything different from the nat
ural sequence OF married life; never
/ seems to occur New York Mil n2G